Amazon has reached an agreement to acquire Ring, the Santa Monica, Calif.-based maker of video cameras, doorbells and other smart home technologies, GeekWire has learned. The companies are expected to…

To start, the cars doing the business test and the cars doing the autonomous testing will be separate: Ford’s Sharif Marakby, VP of Autonomous Vehicles and Electrification, explained on a call that the automaker wants to test both in parallel rather than waiting for the self-driving tech to be ready enough to then deploy the business, so that both parts are fully developed and mature by 2021, when Ford intends to deploy “thousands” of vehicles in commercial operation at scale.

Some very resilient Earth microbes might be able to thrive in the hidden ocean of Enceladus — the icy moon of Saturn that has become a prime candidate in the search for extraterrestrial life. Scientists have successfully cultivated a few of these tiny organisms in the lab under the same conditions that are thought to exist on the distant moon, opening up the possibility that life might be lurking under the world’s surface.

The announcement was made by Joe D'Ambrosia, senior vice president of Original Programming at Disney Junior, who said, "We are very excited to introduce The Rocketeer to our young Disney Junior audience. The vast storytelling found in the original comic books provides the perfect opportunity to create an exciting new adventure series told from a young girl superhero perspective that the whole family can enjoy together."

Samsung incorporates a new dual aperture lens on its 12MP rear-facing camera, which otherwise has the same resolution as the Galaxy S8's rear camera. The lenses can open up to f/1.5 or f/2.4 depending on the shooting conditions, and according to Samsung can offer much better low light performance than the Galaxy S8. The Galaxy S9 camera can also take super slow motion clips at 960fps. If you want dual rear cameras like on the Galaxy Note 8 or iPhone X , you'll need the larger Galaxy S9+.

Going forward, the ESRB will begin adding an "In-Game Purchases" label to boxed games that have any sort of in-game purchase, including loot boxes. "The new In-Game Purchases label will be applied to games with in-game offers to purchase digital goods or premiums with real world currency, including but not limited to bonus levels, skins, surprise items (such as item packs, loot boxes, mystery awards), music, virtual coins and other forms of in-game currency, subscriptions, season passes and upgrades (e.g., to disable ads)," it said in the announcement. The ESRB is also launching ParentalTools.org, a website for parents that provides information on the new label, guides for setting up parental controls and an explanation of the ESRB's rating system.

Coinbase said Friday it will hand over the data in the next 21 days, nearly three months after a US magistrate judge quashed its efforts to keep the Internal Revenue Service from seeing its customers' trading records. Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley in November ordered the exchange to supply the tax agency with the names, addresses and tax identification numbers of all users in the US who conducted at least one bitcoin transaction equivalent to at least $20,000 between 2012 and 2015.

That program was the direct result of revelations that Apple slows down older iPhones in an effort to reduce strain on the battery, while trying to optimize overall performance, and stop random shutdowns from occurring. But analysts, while willing to admit that the program is a good PR move for the company in response to the very public backlash, believe it may have a lasting effect for Apple moving forward.

Senate Democrats have introduced a Congressional resolution to overturn the @FCC 's repeal of #NetNeutrality .
When asked in March of last year, nearly half of broadband users in the U.S. said they did not know their internet connection speed. http://pewrsr.ch/2FysgEd pic.twitter.com/37g2iuXDPc

With last week's official introduction of the FCC's new rules, the Senate had 60 days to vote on Markey's CRA -- if he can't get a majority by April 23rd, the rules will officially change. Even if the required 51 Senators come on board, the bill will still have to pass through the House of Representatives and survive a veto from the president, so this fight is far from over. (For more on the CRA process, this write-up from the New York Times is a worthwhile read.) But even getting 51 Senators to agree on the CRA would also be a bit of a victory, as any stalling would help raise awareness around the country around the FCC's plans. If awareness leads to pressure on the House of Representatives, all the better -- and it could turn net neutrality into a major issue in the 2018 elections this fall.

In standard T-Mobile fashion, the company’s executives knocked AT&T and Verizon for their previously-announced plans to offer earlier 5G services in the forms of mobile hotspots and fixed broadband modems. Once again calling its larger rivals “Dumb and Dumber,” T-Mobile CEO John Legere said that they were “in a meaningless race to be first,” using “pucks” and “routers” that wouldn’t be “truly transformative” for customers, who care about “actual smartphones” and brand new experiences. Live at MWC, T-Mobile CTO Neville Ray noted that for 5G, “you have to have coverage. If you don’t have broad coverage, there’s no way you can deliver this arc of experiences.”

US Supreme Court wrestles with Microsoft data privacy fight, with justices Roberts and Alito hinting support for DoJ's stance; ruling is due by the end of June (Reuters)
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-microsoft/supreme-court-wrestles-with-microsoft-data-privacy-fight-idUSKCN1GB0GY … http://www.techmeme.com/180227/p23#a180227p23 …

Until now, the DMV has allowed companies approved for autonomous vehicle testing to run their cars on the roads, with autonomous driving systems engaged, provided that there’s a trained safety driver behind the wheel ready and able to take over manual control. Now, the regulators are updating their rules to allow for fully driverless test, which is a key step along the route towards actually deploying self-driving vehicles in a commercial capacity.

Those two books are "Factfulness," by the late Hans Rosling, Anna Rosling Ronnlund, and Ola Rosling, and "Enlightenment Now," by Steven Pinker. Both are "amazing" and "very readable," Gates said in the AMA.

Apple will also use the new clinics to test its health-related products and services, according to the report. This could potentially lead to issues if Apple relies too heavily on testing completed by its own employees, which are still largely white and male , and don’t accurately reflect the US population. Recently Apple has launched a study with Stanford University to identify irregular heart rhythms with the Apple Watch’s heart rate sensor, and it‘s reportedly working on an EKG reader for future Apple Watch models.

A t the time of Dave’s death his family were not aware of his involvement in Bitcoin or the wealth he had amassed. But months later Craig revealed their work to his Mr Klein’s brother, Ira and said that Mr Klein had signed his ownership away in exchange for a share in an Australian company that Mr Wright said was worth “millions”.

The Antsle is an incredibly powerful and easy to use tool for deploying virtual machines and containers. These deployed machines are called "antlets" and can be anything from a full-blown server operating system (such as CentOS, Ubuntu Server, or Windows Server) to a desktop OS. Antsle is a developer's dream come true, but can also serve in a production environment. Deploy and develop your antlet and have it running websites, databases, cloud servers, and so much more.

There are four new ads in Apple’s “Switch From Android to iPhone” ad campaign that were added today. The first is entitled “Ease”, the second called “Safe”, while the third and fourth are entitled “Apple Support” and “Environment”, respectively. The longest videos of the bunch measure in at just 16 seconds, while the shortest is 11 seconds.

The app isn't an official release from Xbox, however, unlike Sony's solution. We've reached out to Microsoft for comment and will update this post when we hear back. OneCast promises support for 1080p video, low lag, easy set up and the ability to stream Xbox One titles over the internet (with some manual configuration). OneCast says that you can use an Xbox One wireless controller connected via USB or Bluetooth, use any number of different consoles or gamertags and run in either full screen or windowed mode. You'll get a free 14-day trial for your $10 purchase, which is regularly $20.

The autonomous age promises everything from self-driving cars to driverless delivery vehicles—but what impact will it have on industries, companies, and individuals? This ebook, based on the latest special feature from ZDNet and TechRepublic , looks at emerging autonomous transport technologies and how they will affect society and the future of business. From the ebook:
If you were to talk to a technology optimist about autonomous vehicles and self-driving cars, you’d probably hear about how revolutionary the technology is and how much it will disrupt markets around the world. And it’s true: autonomous vehicles will revolutionize trucking and personal transportation, among other things. But it’s not going to happen tomorrow.
It will take years, maybe decades, for driverless vehicles to reach widespread adoption. The technology behind these innovations is getting closer to achieving full autonomy every day, but the industry still faces obstacles in liability and societal acceptance, as well as negative consumer response to disaster stories.
The technology is robust and getting better every day, with developments like sensor fusion, said 451 Research research director Christian Renaud, but that same technology will play into liability issues.

Consider a different example: someone participates in adding threading to the C++ standard. They then get hired at a development tools company to help implement the standard. Anything unseemly there? Your characterization rests on the premise that the regulations are a priori negative. If you start from the premise that the regulations are good things, then there isn’t necessarily anything wrong or inconsistent about someone saying “I’m going to help create these rules which I think will be good for the industry” and “now I’m going to help companies implement and follow these rules.” I’m pretty skeptical of regulation myself so I can see where you’re coming from. I personally think we should let crypto currencies be complete anarchy as an experiment. But crypto currencies are a good illustration of how regulation and regulators arise naturally. Big bad government doesn’t come in and start regulating things people never complained about. First people lose a lot of money. Second, the industry welcomes some level of regulation, in order to reestablish trust with consumers that might otherwise be scared off.

Benavides: Yeah, absolutely, this is definitely the beginning. Compliance, it's an ongoing requirement. As long as you have the personal data of the data subjects, you have to comply with the GDPR and even if that relationship has ended, you have to delete the data. You have to dispose of that data in the proper manner and it's specified in the GDPR. But there are so many more modalities coming into play here. For example, you can see with IoT, a different Pandora's box can be opened, because we need to think about all of the policies that need to be in place, so the systems, the automated systems are collecting information in such a way that it is within the consent that has been obtained from the customers. For example, if you are in wearables or you are collecting the data in all of their devices, in various devices at home.

Senate Democrats are proposing to undo the FCC’s wrongheaded rule through a process set up by the Congressional Review Act. Unlike most legislation, which must be put on the floor by the majority party and often requires 60 votes in order to move forward, a CRA can be passed with the support of just 51 senators. And any group of 30 of them can force the Senate to consider it. CRA resolutions allow Congress to overturn regulatory actions at federal agencies with a simple majority vote in both chambers. In accordance with the Congressional Review Act, the senators will formally introduce the resolution once the rule is submitted to both houses of Congress and published in the federal register. 1

Apple's new "dual display" patent could potentially allow for a future MacBook or iPad to use a second screen in place of a keyboard, eschewing physical keys.
The United States Patent and Trademark Office has granted Apple a patent titled "dual display equipment with enhanced visibility and suppressed reflections." The documentation for what is patent number 9,904,502 outlines a device that would use a second display as a dynamic keyboard.
Two implementations of this design are described in the patent application, according to Patently Apple . The first utilizes a permanent hinge, while the second allows the screen to be removed and used separately, along the lines of Microsoft's Surface Pro range and other two-in-one computers.
The patent documentation makes it clear that the implementation is not intended as an accessory that would allow two iPads to be paired together, with one serving as the keyboard. Additionally, illustrations associated with the application explicitly state that one screen is an OLED display, while the other is an LCD.
A double-display set-up could provide easy access to a different keyboard layout language, context-sensitive controls, or even a large sketching surface to use in conjunction with something like an Apple Pencil.

Hyundai’s second all-electric vehicle, the Kona Electric, will get a full debut at next week’s Geneva Motor Show, but today the South Korean automaker revealed most of the specs and pulled the wraps off of the new SUV. There’s no pricing yet, but the Kona Electric will come in short-range and long-range models, with 186 and 292 miles of range, respectively.

According to Sprint, its Massive MIMO cell sites will be capable of offering up to 10 times the capacity of current LTE systems, although, obviously, customers will have to see how things shake out in the real world once Sprint begins to roll out the new towers. The new antennas should facilitate rollouts of both gigabit-speed LTE and 5G networks, with the arrays offering the ability to update to 5G via software updates once Sprint actually launches the network. Additionally, the Massive MIMO antennas will be able to support split-mode service, allowing Sprint to continue to offer both 4G LTE and 5G on the same radio once 5G does launch.

In the Apex, the fingerprint reader supports reading two fingerprints in the screen and is spread across the entire lower half of the screen, potentially allowing for a reading of two fingerprints for extra security or less precise placement of one finger on a smaller space.

“I do think the large platforms — Google and Facebook being the most obvious, Twitter and others as well, are part of that ecosystem — have to have a conversation about their business model that recognizes they are a public good as well as a commercial enterprise,” the former president said at MIT’s Sloan Sports Conference last Friday. “They’re not just an invisible platform, they’re shaping our culture in powerful ways.”